Stepping into Huslia was like “stepping back in time” for veteran musher Dee Dee Jonrowe.

“Even the way the kids play is like the way we used to play when we were kids,” she told KNOM’s Matthew Smith. But even the warm hospitality of Huslia couldn’t totally negate the cold trail temperatures.

“My hands are really screwed up,” confessed Jonrowe, who arrived in Huslia amid 40-below temperatures on Saturday. The musher’s fingertips had turned a murky black color, and she had lost much of the feeling in her hands.

“I’m not sure I could light a fire if I got into trouble,” she confessed.

Jonrowe is not the first musher to run into weather-related difficulties during this year’s race — fellow Iditarod veteran Lance Mackey also lost feeling in his hands and fingers, hampering his ability to care for his dog team in Tanana. Mackey’s trouble was somewhat tempered, however, by the assistance of his brother Jason Mackey, who stayed to help his older brother for a portion of the race.

While Jonrowe doesn’t have a sibling on the trail, she says her friends and competitors on the trail make up her own family — and support system.

“You take care of each other out here. You don’t go off and leave somebody in trouble,” she said, referring to a “straight talk” she received from friend and fellow musher Martin Buser.

Jonrowe said she considered rushing ahead, despite her injured fingers, until Buser convinced her otherwise. Now, the pink-clad musher plans to take her time getting to the finish in Nome.

“I’m not going to race. I’m going to travel and enjoy the sport that I love, and the people that I love, and take good care of my dogs, and watch really cool things going on around me,” she said.

DeeDee Jonrowe is excited; about how her team is looking, about the the reroute through Huslia and Koyukuk, and about meeting new folks along the way.

As far as strategy goes, Dee Dee says, “the tow line never lies.” Jonrowe plans on running this race at a pace that is comfortable for her dogs. If there’s deep snow, and they need to camp more, they’ll camp more. Jonrowe says she’s looking forward to the new country she and her dogs are going to experience together.

Allen Moore is fresh off a strong showing at the 2015 Yukon Quest, giving Brent Sass a run for his money until the very end.

But for Iditarod 2015, he’s taking a back seat while Aliy Zirkle runs their kennel’s strongest team. Moore takes the pups, or the “JV team” as he calls it, pairing much older dogs with much younger dogs, allowing the former to teach the younger group about the trail. Looking at the new route, Moore says that the interior will be nothing new, as it’s where he and Aliy train. Cold temperatures, hills, rivers, they’ll be ready. But when it comes to the coast, he says, “you have to prepare for the worst that can happen.”

Rookie Becca Moore is no stranger to mushing. Husband Ramey Smyth has run 20 Iditarods and mushing runs deep in his family. Becca says she’s representing the Smyth clan for Iditarod 2015.

About 1/3 of her team have run Iditarod before with Ramey, and the other part of the team is new. She feels prepared to camp, but without any experience on coastal trails, she knows once she hits Unalakleet, she’ll be treading on unfamiliar territory.

In its 36th year, Kaiser’s win is the first time in 29 years that a local western Alaska musher has won the mid-distance race. Bethel’s Myron Angstman was the last such winner back in 1986.

Last year’s winner, Rohn Buser, held a commanding lead throughout the first half of the race. But in retracing the trail from Aniak and back to Bethel, Buser’s runs grew longer as his team slowed slightly. Kaiser’s dog team remained consistent, posting runs between checkpoints that differed little from the first half of the race. That allowed Kaiser to whittle down Buser’s seven-minute lead out of the the final four-hour layover at the Tuluksak checkpoint, with Kaiser overtaking Buser about six or seven miles out of the checkpoint.

“This team is so locked into a speed right now,” Kaiser told KYUK radio in Bethel. “Whether they’re fresh or tired, they get locked into that consistent speed.”

Buser also took a wrong turn off the trail just 12 miles outside of Bethel (a mistake his father Martin Buser also made on his way in to the finish line), heading instead southwest into the Church Slough truck road. It remains unclear what, if any, adjustments will be made against the mushers’ times for leaving the trail.

In the end Buser crossed the finish line 13 minutes behind Kaiser. Third place went to Jeff King, who arrived at 5:58 a.m, followed by Tony Browning in fourth and Ken Anderson in fifth.

Mushers from the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta included Mike Williams Jr., who finished in 11th place; Richie Diehl, who finished 13th, and Mike Williams Sr., who was 17th. Isaac and Nathan Underwood scratched in Aniak, as did Kotzebue musher Chuck Schaeffer.

Though Kaiser’s total trail time of just over 35 hours was the fastest in the race’s history, it was also along a shorter trail, with poor conditions on the river resulting in the removal of the Whitefish Lake loop leading into the Aniak halfway point. Race organizer Myron Angstman said this year’s time will be noted with an asterisk in the K300 record books due to the shortened trail.

Kaiser takes home $25,000 for winning the race, from a record-high purse of $123,300.

Two Nome mushers also finished the Kuskokwim 300 this weekend, Rolland Trowbridge and Tara Cicatello.

Finishing in 19th place was Rolland Trowbridge, who was the Red Lantern during his rookie K300 race last year. He was vying for 18th with Scott Janssen, and led him into Tuluksak early Sunday morning. But Janssen gained ground and passed Trowbridge just past Kwethluk.

Rolland Trowbridge on the K300 trail. Photo: Ben Matheson, KYUK.

Trowbridge—who is also KNOM’s Chief Engineer—finished the race with seven dogs on his team. He said he’s proud of his team’s performance but the icy trail meant he and many other mushers were returning home with injured teams.

“I am very happy with how the race went. That being said, the dogs really took a pounding,” Trowbridge said in a phone interview Sunday. “I think everybody’s teams suffered a lot. A lot of dropped dogs. All of my dogs that were dropped were not dropped from exhaustion, they were dropped from injuries. It’s hard to see dogs get hurt, for me. You know I don’t like dropping dogs.”

Trowbridge says those dropped dogs are a result of the fast icy trail, which was so slick he says he stood on his sled’s brake for the first 40 miles of the race to keep his team from going too fast. That’s not likely to be a problem during his next race, the Yukon Quest, which starts in just under three weeks. He said after the icy, sprint-race conditions of the K300 trail, he’ll be happy to have the 1,000-mile trail and longer rest time of the Quest.

The other Nome musher in the race this year was Tara Cicatello, a former KNOM volunteer and handler for Trowbridge. Cicatello finished with seven dogs as the 21st musher in to the finish around 12:40 a.m. Monday.

Tara Cicatello at the K300 finish. Photo: Ben Matheson, KYUK.

“It was a long haul but it was a lot of fun,” she told KYUK’s Ben Matheson. “I don’t know, the dogs did great and I’m very happy with them. This is my first ever sled dog race … you learn about the dedication it takes to be a musher. I give a lot of credit to the people who put this together, to mushers in general, to the dogs running 300 miles. Lots of things you learn.”

Cicatello finished one position ahead of the race’s red lantern, which went to Dee Dee Jonrowe and her puppy team, the last to cross the finish line just after 1:30 a.m. Monday.

KYUK’s Ben Matheson contributed to this story.

]]>http://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2015/01/19/bethels-pete-kaiser-wins-kuskokwim-300/feed/1In Anchorage, right before the start: Zirkle, Jonrowe, and Ambrosehttp://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2013/03/04/in-anchorage-right-before-the-start-zirkle-jonrowe-and-ambrose/
http://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2013/03/04/in-anchorage-right-before-the-start-zirkle-jonrowe-and-ambrose/#commentsMon, 04 Mar 2013 21:38:30 +0000http://www.knom.org/on-the-trail/wp/?p=1616Aliy Zirkle’s team is fresh from a win with husband Allen Moore at the Yukon Quest this year. Her dogs are well-trained, in great shape, and have seen this race before. Zirkle says she’s running the same team as last year, when she finished in second position, and almost the same team as 2011. She realizes the trail is long and can bring surprises, but tells KNOM’s Laureli Kinneen, “Hopefully 1000 miles will be simply, a fast 1000 miles.” She’s excited to get to Nome.
http://www.knom.org/wp-audio/2013/03/2013-03-01-knom-ott-anc-zirkle.mp3

DeeDee Jonrowe is happy to be on the trail again this year, and sees it as a big “family reunion.” But at the race start, she told KNOM’s Laureli Kinneen that she could win this race. After a top-10 finish last year, DeeDee can taste victory. She says many mushers in the field are poised for a first-place finish, and the chips just have to fall into place. She counts herself as a powerful contender for a win. “You gotta be ready. You gotta be poised. You gotta have done your homework. You gotta spend time on your knees. You gotta know what you’re planning for, and we’ve done that. We’ve done the hard work.”

St. Michael’s Louis Ambrose is excited to keep father-in-law Jerry Austin’s name in the Iditarod. Iditarod veteran Jerry Austin inspired Ambrose to pick up mushing, and he told KNOM’s Laureli Kinneen, “I kind of felt like it was my obligation to the Austins to carry on his name.” Ambrose is excited to be headed back toward Western Alaska. After training two months in Willow, he knows his kids are going to be waiting for him at the finish. “That’s my incentive to get there as quick as I can.”

At the time of posting, Aliy Zirkle is in third position into Rainy Pass this morning at 9:19. Dee Dee Jonrowe is in fifth position, into Rainy Pass at 10:11am. Louis Ambrose is into Finger Lake as of 8:33am.